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SBTVD, short for Sistema Brasileiro de Televisão Digital (English: Brazilian Digital Television System) is an ISDB-based digital television standard for Brazil. Developed by an association including Brazilian government, Brazilian universities and communication companies, the system was launched on December 2, 2007.

Before SBTVD, from 1999 to 2000, the ABERT/SET group in Brazil did system comparison tests of DTV under the supervision of the CPqD foundation. The comparison tests were done under the direction of a work group of SET and ABERT. The ABERT/SET group selected ISDB-T as the best system among ATSC, DVB-T and ISDB-T. The outdoor coverage of field-tests result in "Brazilian digital television tests" show that ISDB-T is most robust system in Brazil. ^[1]

Brazil government founded the SBTVD committee on November 27, 2003.

The ISDB standard is currently being used in Japanese largest metropolitan areas. The decision towards its adoption was based partly due to the portability (e.g. 1seg) of this standard allowing people watch TV in portable devices, as cellular phones.

Mobile phone and wireless device access was one of the four requirements made by the Brazilian government for the intended system, the others being high definition, interactive TV and the capability of mobile reception of HDTV or SDTV in a moving vehicle.

The official announcement of ISDB-T modulation will be used as the base for SBTVD came in June 2006. The video codec selected was MPEG-4 (H.264), while Japan uses MPEG-2. 1seg broadcasts use the same standard as in Japan, including codec, modulation and interactive features. Hardware can be shared between Japan and Brazil, with only software changes to address the encoding difference..

Samsung was the first company to do a public demo of SBTVD transmissions and receivers on June 19, 2007, although other companies claim to have receivers ready. At their showroom in São Paulo, two Full HD LCD sets were shown: one with a built-in tuner and another connected to aprototype set-top box. Tuner and set-top box were developed in Brazil, at Samsung's research center in Manaus, Amazonas. 1seg broadcasting to mobile devices was also shown.

The signal was a test reel from Rede Globo (the biggest TV network in Brazil), broadcast at 1080i (the standard does not define 1080p) consisting of short clips from soap operas, talk shows and soccer games from recent years, along with some scenic views. None of the content was HDTV native, but was upscaled at the station from lower resolution sources. Thus, encoding artifacts could be seen.

Regular SBTVD transmissions started on December 2 2007, initially in São Paulo. Rio de Janeiro and other cities (Brasilia, Belo Horizonte, Curitiba, Porto Alegre) are set to receive the signal in early 2008. The Brazilian government estimates 100% coverage in 7 years. Initial broadcasts lacked the proposed interactive services platform, the middleware named Ginga. DRM issues are quite unclear. Due to this, early set-top boxes may lack support for this technology, with hardware upgrades being required later or substitution of the whole equpment. At launch by December 2nd, set-top boxes were available for prices ranging between U$450 and U$600, inhibiting sales. At that time President Lula announced subsidies worth 1 billion Reais (U$ 556 millions) to turn these converters affordable to people (http://ultimosegundo.ig.com.br/economia/2007/12/02/lula_deve_anunciar_incentivo_fiscais_para_decodificadores_1103199.html).

According to the government, analog shutdown is scheduled for 2016.

•  Brazil

• SBTVD Forum - all in Portuguese
• The SBTVD website of the Brazilian Communications Ministry
• Pictures of the Samsung Public SBTVD demo in São Paulo
• A blog covering the implementation of digital terrestrial TV around the world